Giovanna Virgil is a graduate student at the Fondazione Accademia di Imola in Italy where she studies Musica da Camera with saxophonist, Marco Albonetti. Virgil is an accomplished soloist, chamber musician, and educator. As an active performer, she has performed with the Hartt Symphony, Greenport Wind Ensemble, Penumbral Quartet, Duo TPK, & Hartt Saxophone Ensemble. She has commissioned or premiered new works by composers Gala Flagello, Joseph David Spence, David Macbride, Robert Carl, Steve Gryc, & the University of Hartford’s President, President Gregory Woodward.

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Virgil is an annual performer at the North American Saxophone Alliance Biennial & Regional Conferences, & the International Navy Band Saxophone Symposium. At the most recent 2020 conferences she presented a commissioning project on mental health and being a musician featuring composers Gala Flagello & Joseph David Spence with Duo TPK (saxophonists Giovanna Virgil & Joseph David Spence). 

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She earned a Bachelor’s of Music in saxophone performance with a minor in performing arts management with honors from The Hartt School, University of Hartford. During the COVID-19 Pandemic she presented three online recitals. First being a recital by Duo TPK featuring new arrangements and pieces for saxophone duo, including the commissions presented at the aforementioned conferences. This performance can be found on her YouTube page and is titled ‘Amidst the Chaos: A Quarantine Recital.’ In addition, to this performance, Virgil presented her final solo degree recital to fulfill her requirements at The Hartt School & her honors thesis on video game music in the concert hall. This project was presented online with the Penumbral Saxophone Quartet (Owen Nichols, soprano saxophone; Aislinn Walters, alto saxophone; Giovanna Virgil, tenor saxophone; & Garrett Evans, baritone saxophone) & can be found on her YouTube page. Her principal teachers include Marco Albonetti, Carrie Koffman, & Rob Wilkerson.

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In addition to her saxophone playing, Virgil has worked for the Hartford Symphony Orchestra as a Production Assistant and Instrumental Discovery Lab Workshop Facilitator under the supervision of Dr. Colette Hall.

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When she is not playing or teaching, you can usually find Giovanna with a coffee in her hand entertaining her colleagues. Most recently, Virgil became a cat mom to Astro-who is not a saxophone lover by nature. Her goal is to have him tolerate her playing for more than ten minutes at a time. Giovanna has found out that cats- while we find them comforting- are in fact not great audience members & are quite rude with the occasional yawning and leaving abruptly.

 

For performance or teaching inquires, please visit the contact page.